


carrionbirds overhead

by kosy



Category: Archive 81 (Podcast)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Light Angst, Slice of Life, also hello marck. if you're going to vague about this one please at least promo the link. thank you, but like 1994 while melody is doing her interviews so also pre-canon?, however it's a81 so the slice is kind of a mixed bag of emotions, set in season one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:34:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26559001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kosy/pseuds/kosy
Summary: She climbs up to the fire escape even on the rare nights that Melody does come home on time. She’s justwaiting,a dread she can’t explain sinking low in her stomach.
Relationships: Melody Pendras/Alexa Kesslen
Comments: 14
Kudos: 26





	carrionbirds overhead

**Author's Note:**

> hello! i love these two and i figured it was high time that i write about them. hope you all enjoy!

She doesn’t mean to make her way out to the fire escape each evening. She thinks it’s maybe just engrained in her at this point, though, something for which she has no name. Ritualistic, almost. She’s waiting for—she’s waiting. 

The sun is dipping below the horizon and it’s still unforgivingly hot. Not clean-hot the way it got when she went out camping in the mountains in the summer. Dirty-hot, muggy-hot. New York City is like that, Alexa figures. She still misses Augusts that didn’t feel like they hated her personally.

Melody keeps insisting that they don’t need an A/C unit, that the little box fan they’ve got wedged into their bedroom window is more than enough for them, but that’s because Melody is a goddamn  _ maniac.  _

Melody hasn’t been home in two days. 

Alexa knows it’s stupid to be worried about her. It’s not like she has a particularly dangerous job. She just interviews people. And sometimes they’re weird, sure, but they generally aren’t murderers or whatever. They’re just a bunch of people who happen to live in a specific building. Melody is fine. She’s fine. 

If she’s looked more tired lately, more strung out, it’s just because the hours are long. The hours  _ are _ long. It’s not uncommon for her to be gone from dawn ‘til dusk, doing those interviews she refuses to tell Alexa about even a little bit. It’s a normal job. A perfectly fine government job. Two days is pushing it, sure, but. But. 

The clouds are burning up over the city in the sunset and the skyscraper windows are pink with it. The haze is tinted a warm orange, and the fading sunlight shines golden through the streets. It looks like one of those old Romantic-era paintings. Epic natural landscapes. Or battles. Limned in gold either way. 

Alexa doesn’t know what possesses her to come up here each evening. She’s tried to psychoanalyze it before because God forbid she just live in a moment and accept that it’s happening, but there’s nothing. None of what she’d expect, anyway: no longing for a better life, no yearning for the return of a lover. She climbs up to the fire escape even on the rare nights that Melody does come home on time. She’s just  _ waiting, _ a dread she can’t explain sinking low in her stomach. 

The scream of a siren below. “I thought you might be up here.”

She turns, pushing off the railing, and somehow isn’t even surprised when Melody’s standing there, just a few feet away. She looks exhausted and small in a way she’s never seen her before, like if Alexa held her too close and too tight she would disappear in her arms entirely, folded away. The skin around her cuticles is bleeding. There are bags under her eyes. 

Alexa bites back the instinctive  _ Are you okay? _ She knows better than to think Melody would want to hear it. 

“You were right,” she says instead. “Here I am.”

“I’m sorry,” Melody says. There’s that veneer over her tone that she gets sometimes, that customer-service voice, that interviewer voice. Overly apologetic, overly appeasing. Carefully detached. Her arms are crossed over her chest, fingers knotted up in the sleeves of her shirt. 

Instead of answering, Alexa holds her arms open, and, after a moment of hesitation, Melody steps into them, not quite hugging her but instead leaning against her, forehead pressed to Alexa’s cheek. Alexa rests a palm between Melody’s shoulderblades, feels the shuddering in-out rhythm of her breath. 

“Did you pick up dinner on the way back?” she asks after a long moment. “‘Cause I haven’t had time to run to the store this week and all we’ve got left is, like, snacks and breakfast stuff. Which is fine, but—” 

“Yeah, I grabbed takeout,” Melody says. Her hair is dirty where it presses against Alexa’s skin, but it still smells like her. Not much, but it’s something. “I know you’re not a huge fan of Mazzotti’s but the pasta’s cheap there and it was on my way, so.” 

She breathes out a laugh. “I didn’t think you’d actually get dinner.” 

“Well, it  _ was _ my night. Plus, I mean…” She pulls back, mouth drawing sideways. “I feel like I owe you.” 

“You don’t owe me anything, Melody. Work is work.” Alexa shrugs. “I get it. I don’t blame you, alright?” 

“Yeah, work is work, but you’re you. And that’s more important to me.” Which is exactly the kind of sappy bullshit she should’ve expected, but it still startles a snort out of Alexa. Melody gives her a weary smile, like  _ I know, but there it is.  _

“Seriously, babe, you’re fine. Just, like… try to find a way to let me know if it happens again? The landline still works, you know.” 

Melody sighs. “Against all odds. I know, just… I don’t want to drag you into this.” 

“Drag me into  _ what?” _ Alexa asks, cocking her head, and immediately regrets it—it’s like a door slams shut somewhere inside Melody, and while she doesn’t move at all, the shift is tangible. She can feel the muscles in her back tense. Her heart drops. Things had seemed to be going okay for once.

“Nothing.”    


“You can’t tell me anything?” 

“No.” 

“The NDA?” 

“...yeah.” She's never sounded less convincing.

Alexa laughs, and it sounds more bitter than she'd thought it would. “Since when do you care about what the government says you can and can’t do?” 

Melody bites down on her own lower lip sudden and hard, hard enough to draw blood, and Alexa flinches back in secondhand pain. Melody doesn’t even react. “Please. Just trust me. I need you to trust me.” Her voice is low, intense. She doesn’t look away. Won’t so much as blink.

“Okay,” she says softly, “of course,” because of course she trusts her, she can’t imagine existing in any way other than stupidly in love with this woman, and Melody relaxes ever so slightly, leaning her head back against hers. 

“It’ll be over soon,” she says. “I promise, Alexa.” 

“Okay,” Alexa repeats, and Melody squeezes her forearm and turns her face sideways to press chapped lips against hers, lingering. The taste of blood lingers too. Alexa closes her eyes and brings up her other hand to hold Melody’s jaw lightly. 

“Hey,” Melody whispers, just a fraction of an inch away. She can feel her breath on her lips.

“Hi,” she says. There’s sadness in those brown eyes, the kind that doesn’t line up with where they are and what they’re doing, the kind that means she’s grieving something that isn’t even dead yet. An ending is coming, and it will be soon, and she won’t tell her what it is. But Alexa doesn’t comment on it. Doesn’t ask. Melody never was comfortable being the interviewee. 

Melody runs a thumb up the inside of her wrist, and Alexa shivers despite the heat. “Wanna go inside and get some dinner?” 

“Yeah. Sounds good.” 

She nods once, and then again as if to reassure herself. “Yeah. We can—um, we’ll probably have to reheat the food, but we can watch TV while we eat, I need to catch up on the news—” 

“As thrilling as I’m sure it’d be to watch you scream epithets at Newt Gingrich yet again, I don’t think my blood pressure can handle it at the moment,” Alexa says wryly, and Melody rolls her eyes. 

“You have no sense of fun, you know. Fine, we can just turn on the radio,” she concedes, pushing herself away from Alexa and back toward the apartment. “You still have that wine from a week ago?” 

“Yeah, I’ve been saving it. I figured we’d split it when you got back.” 

“Aw. Thanks.” 

Alexa follows her back inside. “I mean, I wasn’t just gonna drink it without you.” 

“That’s what I would have done.” 

“Well, I’m a woman of honor. Unlike you, apparently.” 

Melody snorts, dumping pasta from a takeout box onto a dinner plate from the cupboard. “Sure, babe.” 

They prepare dinner mostly in silence after that. Melody turns on the radio and sets it in the windowsill and they listen to “Fast Car” and they both think about that old romantic daydream, dancing in the kitchen with the love of your life, and neither of them do anything about it. Just lean against the counter side by side, watching the timer on the microwave count itself down. Melody rests the side of her head against Alexa’s shoulder where the strap of her tank top is starting to slip. They look straight ahead. It feels as though they are on the edge of something terrible. Alexa can feel the sweat at Melody’s hairline against her bare skin. She holds her breath. She refuses to mourn something that is still alive. 

“Love you,” Alexa says, just quiet enough that it could maybe get lost under Tracy Chapman’s guitar. 

“Love you too,” Melody says back, like she was listening for it desperately. Maybe she was. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!! my a81 tumblr is @naverlee if you're interested in following me there, and comments and kudos are super appreciated if you feel inclined to leave them! or go listen to fast car both are good


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